Consumer Products

Background:

The Air Resources Board has authority to adopt regulatory requirements for chemically formulated consumer products, fuel containers, and indoor air cleaning products. Our Consumer Products Regulatory Program is an important part of ARB's overall effort to reduce the amount of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that are emitted from the use of chemically formulated consumer products. "Consumer product" means a chemically formulated product used by household and institutional consumers, including, but not limited to, detergents; cleaning compounds; polishes; floor finishes; cosmetics; personal care products; home, lawn, and garden products; disinfectants; sanitizers; aerosol paints; and automotive specialty products; but does not include other paint products, furniture coatings, or architectural coatings.

VOCs that are emitted into the air from consumer products and other sources (motor vehicles, stationary sources, etc.) react with other pollutants under sunlight to form ground-level ozone and particulate matter (PM 10), the main ingredients in smog. Reducing VOC emissions from consumer products therefore plays an integral part in ARB's effort to reduce smog in California.

What's New		This area includes announcements of very recent activities such as recently released documents, workshops and meetings. In some instances, a set of meetings might be scheduled for a one or two-day period, in which case agendas and supporting documents will be made available in this area. In many cases, these same documents will be linkable from other consumer product areas within this website.
General Information and Contact List		This area presents some background materials concerning the ARB's efforts to reduce volatile organic compounds from consumer products. These include a fact sheet regarding consumer products and smog, a contact list for ARB staff working in this program, a legal opinion on ARB's authority to regulate consumer products and a link to the Consumer Products Enforcement Program.
Regulatory Activity - "Formal" or "Informal"		The ARB works closely with all stakeholders to develop technologically and commercially feasible regulations that help to reduce VOC emissions from consumer products. This process can be divided into two types of regulatory activity - "Formal" and "Informal."
		"Formal" regulatory activity refers to the activity that actually involves the formal "rulemaking" process. The formal regulatory activity always begins with the release of the 45-Day Hearing Notice. In this area of the website, there are various documents associated with the rulemaking process. These documents include the Staff Report / Initial Statement of Reasons for the Proposed Rulemaking, 15-Day Notice, documents forwarded to the Office of Administrative Law (OAL) for formal approval, and acknowledgement of the OAL's action on the rulemaking. The "Formal" page is found by going through the informal regulatory activity pages.
		"Informal" regulatory activity refers to all activity that is NOT directly involved in the formal rulemaking process. The informal regulatory activity is comprised of all activities that either (1) are ongoing, (2) have led to a formal rulemaking process, or (3) have not and will not lead to a formal rulemaking process. These activities include the State Implementation Plan development activity, the Consumer Products Working Group meetings, subgroup meetings, workshops, teleconferences, and development of surveys, survey results, reports, and other documents.
Consumer Products Regulations and Test Methods		Currently, there are five consumer product regulations plus the consumer product test method 310.

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